Tagged: creative thinking

Here are a few photos of what I’ve done for my final project. I admit it’s not quite as different from the original Monopoly, but I’m happy of how much fun I had making this, especially the tokens. I experimented a bit on the materials and printing (as I’m not very familiar with art supply and printing stores here in Taipei as I am back home), working with stores I could find at short notice. I really enjoy simply DIY and craft projects like this, although this wasn’t as neat as I’d imagined, hahaha! Anyway, the all-nighters paid off when I showed it in class, when the professor commented that it was “cute.” ❤

I had changed the title of my project a bit from Collect 200 to Monopoly: Love Edition, but the reason for choosing Monopoly as a reference for love is still quite the same. Love is indeed complex, time-consuming, emotional rollercoaster ride. There are definitely times that you just want to give up when you see you’re about to lose it all, but remember that there’s always the teeny-weeny chance that everything changes for the good. So we should all persevere and be optimistic about life and love… you’ll never know when you land on that Collect 200 space!

Work in progress… 1/4 of the game board!

Completed game board!

Oddly-scaled prototypes of the tokens… The grand piano’s my favorite of them all.

I’d been thinking about what to do for my project for many weeks now, but it was only recently that I was able to come up with a more concrete idea based on the things I’ve explored related to love. The professor had explained to me that I needed to be more specific about my final statement about love, because the idea I’d pitched was too broad and vague. And when I was asked to articulate about my idea/statement, I realized that I still had difficulty explaining it, because my statement lacked details. And so, everyday for many weeks, I would think of my statement and tried to narrow it down to a more specific topic.

Since our professor wanted us to stick to our original idea, I tried to explore more about the concept of a journey—its nature, and the things usually related/involved with it. Again, I tried to organize my ideas using a mindmap (a tool which I never realized could be so useful), which I drew by hand on a sketchpad. I’ve attached a photo of the mindmap so you can see what I came up with so far (click on the image to see the original size). A few weeks after I drew this mindmap, I realized that I wanted to focus on thenature of a journey, because I think love is just like a journey that we undertake throughout our lifetime.

Considering that each person’s understanding and meaning of love is unique, and that love is very much unpredictable, I began thinking of how a journey could be represented/applicable in real-life situations. And then I remembered the Monopoly board game (which I was fond of playing when I was younger), whose gameplay is indeed unpredictable because of the rolling of dice. The dice signify the concept of “chance” or “fate,” which then contributes to a varying or uncertain journey around the game board.

The title of “Collect 200” was then developed as a diminutive of the name of the starting box in Monopoly–which is “Collect $200 Salary As You Pass Go.” I’d chosen this part of the game board as a title because it represents the starting and ending point of a journey, in addition to being a place that provides free money. For anyone who has experience playing the game, “Collect 200” is a phrase often said by players throughout a game session, because players are eager to collect money. In a sense, reaching or passing through “Collect 200” is each player’s goal—something that keeps them going. But getting to that box is not easy, especially when all the properties on the board have been bought by players, and you are required to pay rent when you land on a property you don’t own. Suddenly, the free money is no longer just that, it becomes a form of “reward” for completing the circuit and surviving the game.

Indeed, there are many aspects of the board game that can describe love even further, but I’ve only summarized the most important ones in the short draft of the narrative I’ve written during the weekend. Hopefully I can develop more ideas as I go along, but for now I just wanted to introduce what I’ve worked out so far.

How you define love is similar to how you define life. It’s how you see the world and how you react to whatever life throws at you. You have the option of holding on to life or letting go. Whichever you choose tells a little bit of your values, and what you hold dear.

A lot of things won’t make sense, and you don’t know why things happen. At first you think you know what you’re doing, but later on you realize that you totally had no idea on how to go on. And so you experiment. But you’re not 100% sure if things will work your way or not. And then you learn from mistakes.

Be prepared to feel baffled, disappointed, frustrated, ecstatic, intrigued, impressed, and a whole lot more of crazy emotions. Life wasn’t meant to be always easy. Sometimes we have to experience pain and grief to be able to fully grasp the idea of happiness, however fleeting it might be.

There’s bound to be conflicts between people, because each person’s definition of life is different. How you make use of your time and resources throughout your lifetime speaks loudly of what you want from it. Of course, we may be cautious occasionally, especially when we’re comparing our investments and dividends/returns. No one wants to be on the losing side, unless you’re the type of person who is content with giving rather than taking.

If there’s anything that is more valuable than money that you can offer to the people/things you love, it would be time. Once time is spent, you can’t get it back. Great artists honed their skills by spending tremendous amount of time on their craft. Day in, day out, they would make something everyday, or try out a new technique until they get the hang of it. And when they’ve mastered the technique, they would make more products in order to stretch the limits of their skill and knowledge. As for people, we spend time with family and friends to strengthen our bond with them. We talk and hang out with them to know more about their daily lives, and from there we maintain the emotional connection. The more time we spend with them, the more we value our relationships.

Spending time doing things you love, whether it’s a simple task like reading, cooking, or cleaning the house, is very important—not only for others, but also for yourself. It is when you’ve accepted that you like doing a certain routine, activity, or people, that you realize what kind of person you are. You also discover your values, ideals, and priorities. After you’ve spent time with someone or something, memories will be what you will mostly remember, not precisely the amount of time you spent. Yes, occasionally you would remember how long you’ve talked on the phone with your family, but the fact that you did something with someone/something you love is what really matters. In relationships, other people will remember you for what good (or bad) you’ve done for them, no matter how small a gesture it is.

It’s also when you spend time with things or people you love that you feel a little bit of happiness, even momentarily. We may not feel happy all day every single day, but I think it’s also good to do something for yourself that makes you happy—whether it’s chatting with high school friends you haven’t talked to for months, reading a fiction novel in two hours, or having dinner and movie date with the occasionally annoying siblings. Even doing things that may not necessarily cause immediate happiness (i.e. doing house chores or going to work)—we should also do it. It gives us a sense of accomplishment, and keeps us going everyday. It’s a reminder that we’re alive, and we still have a purpose in this world.

Indeed, I believe that we’re living in the world for a certain purpose—it’s just that we don’t know that exact purpose. So we live on… struggling with life, living with family and friends, coping with work stress…. it definitely has something to do with finding out the purpose of our life.

The ideograph of a red heart (displayed on Taipei 101) is widely known and recognized all around the world. Even young children learning their letters and shapes are being taught to associate the shape with the word “heart” and “love.” Valentine’s cards, balloons, and even cakes being sold sometimes come in this shape. There are three theories (none of which can be proven to be more valid than the others) of how the heart symbol came about: it was modeled after the human heart; the form and shape of the female body; and following the shape of the Silphium plant seed.

To the curious, the human heart is nowhere close to the shape of a real heart. If you’ve never seen an image of a real heart, this cartoon/drawing version might help:

It’s not quite the same, right? It doesn’t appear to be symmetric, nor does it taper to a sharp point at the bottom, even when looking at it from different angles.But then, there are some people who might argue that the human heart resembles the heart symbol we’ve all been accustomed to. Their interpretation of how the human heart appears to them could be different from how we look at it (in an objective manner, of course).

There are even people who associate the heart symbol with the female torso—the pattern made by the breasts to the genitals (some even say the buttocks). I honestly don’t know what to make of this, but it is just a theory anyway.

The third theory is related to the now-extinct plant seed of silphium, which was traded in the 7th century BC in Cyrene. It was originally used as a seasoning, but it was later used as a form of birth-control. The seedpod of the plant looked a lot like the heart symbol we are familiar with, and this shape was found in the Cyrene coins.

So how did it happen that when we see the ♥ or ♡ shape, we easily remember it to be a representation of a heart? I think we’ll never know, considering even the history of it cannot be traced. Nor would we know how that symbol became popular. I’m guessing the heart symbol only became widely popular after the 1800’s or 1900’s, because people wrote love letters using more of poetic words than graphic symbols.

I believe the usage of the heart symbol has simplified the act of expressing love, even though the symbol has decreased the necessity of articulating what a person really means. When using language, a person has to think of (or try to grasp) the word that best describes their exact feelings. With graphics, one can simply use the heart symbol, but the recipient cannot accurately gauge the extent of the sender’s feelings, just that they know the “love” exists. And I think that’s the complex thing about graphics or symbolism nowadays—it can be interpreted in so many ways. Nevertheless, what really matters is its capability to express ideas and emotions.

I’ve never really liked science (mostly biological sciences) or mathematics when I was young. As I’ve mentioned in one of my previous posts, I’ve been more into reading fiction than anything else. I disliked reading school-related textbooks, probably just like every other “average” kid in the world. It was also the time that I wanted to learn more about different languages like Spanish and Japanese (which I still haven’t done). Having read fiction books for years, I knew I was much better in English grammar, spelling, and vocabulary than my other classmates. But for science and math, I did not really mind if I didn’t excel in them.

Overcoming Mathematics

When I stepped into my third year in high school, we had a really funny and kindhearted Geometry teacher. His way of teaching was very different from others–he taught in a lively manner, and he was always smiling despite the students providing the wrong answer. Instead of frowning, he would say some witty comment and encourage another student to try figuring out the problem. I believe many of the students liked him, even if they did not completely understand the lessons.

Geometry was the subject in which I did not have to worry about solving problems numerically. Instead, we were taught about proofing–we had to prove that one triangle was equal to another based on theorems and corollaries. I had no idea why or how, just that I began to like (and appreciate) math just because I suddenly “understood” the logic of proofing. I was actually excited to learn more about math; and when a classmate would ask how I got the answer, I was happy to explain the process to them. And sure enough, my efforts paid off and began to excel in that class.

Fourth-year Physics and Trigonometry ended being not so bad, either. The teachers were less dynamic than the Geometry teacher, but they were nice. Yes, we were back to numerical calculations, but the science and math subjects were not as intimidating as before. Our Geometry teacher showed us that math can be interesting–that we could learn how to like math despite its complexity. He also displayed a very inspiring love for teaching and for God. Having studied in a Christian school, he was probably the first non-Bible teacher who would encourage us to have faith in God. And, the last I heard of him, he had attended a Biblical seminary in order to serve in the ministry.

When I attended university for my undergraduate, despite my initial fears of failing in my math classes (mainly because I did not do well during my primary and the first two years of secondary education), I actually didn’t have much difficulty. Yes, the Plane Geometry was confusing at first, but the other math-related subjects I took for the next four years were not as bad as I thought. Some of them (like Engineering Statics) were pretty easy because I’ve learnt them during my high school Physics class.

Embracing the Sciences

When asked why I chose to study Architecture for my undergraduate, my immediate response would be “Because I want to be an architect.” And the second reason was (which I thought made good sense to me at that time) “I can’t imagine myself studying any Pre-Medicine course. I prefer math than science.” And this was true for many years. Or at least until I was in fourth year of my undergraduate studies.

During that four year, we were required to enroll for a General Psychology class, which I expected not to like. My older sister had studied Psychology for her undergraduate, and I knew she had taken many biological science subjects. I remember her reading many textbooks and class notes, studying for exams, and even taking the cadaver of a cat home to dissect it late at night (I accompanied her in the garage while she dissected the cat). And I didn’t understand why she had to study all those Anatomy, Zoology, Biology classes. Psychology was a mystery to me—I didn’t know what its purpose was until I had to take that Psych class in college.

What I didn’t expect was that my complete aversion (and avoidance) of sciences lessened as I learned more about the history and branches of Psychology. I read our considerably-thin Psych textbook, and ended up doing additional independent research (a.k.a. surfing the Net/Google) about how Psychology could be related to Architecture. Sure enough, there was a branch of Psychology that did apply Psychology concepts to Architecture—Environmental Psychology. Since then, I have occasionally watched TV documentaries (mostly BBC) and audio lectures (from Yale’s OpenCourseWare) to learn more about the field. I grew more and more fascinated about Psych, and a little bit of Neuroscience. It is actually interesting how they are all interrelated—I hope to someday learn more about how people’s behavior can affect architectural design and vice-versa.

Putting Them All Together

Truly, I am grateful for that Geometry teacher and Psych instructor for inspiring me to do better; to not fear failure just because I had one or two mistakes on my exam; to believe in my own skills and abilities; and, most of all, to not fear change. The change I refer to is the change in my interests, preferences, and dreams

One would think that it’s important to stay dedicated or committed to a decision, but I think at this point in my life, I think change is good. I’ve been too used to staying in one place and doing the same things like other people. But taking risks (like my decision to apply for graduate studies in Taiwan) is an adventure by itself—I wouldn’t be able to know my limits if I didn’t attempt to push myself towards anything. Experiencing more things provided me with new ideas (whether school-related or just random stuff), and those experiences definitely enhanced my perception of the world around me.

I was checking my Facebook account when I came across a few interesting text-graphics. It’s simple, straightforward, and makes sense.

There are occasions wherein we worry so much about what other people would think about us, hoping they would like us if we behave like them. Or at least act like the way you think would appeal to them. Humans are social creatures; I doubt there’s anyone who would willingly isolate themselves from society (unless you’re eccentric like Edward Scissorhands). We want to fit in, be able to carry a casual conversation with someone, and expand our social circles. But somewhere along the way, you discover that your personality and identity just doesn’t match/click with a certain group. So you have to make a choice—whether change yourself to fit in with that group, or step away in order to retain yourself. And so you distance yourself from them, all the while feeling awkward and lonely. Then you move on with your life, thinking there must surely be another group of people who would appreciate you in your entirety. Sure enough, you realize that those kind of friends have been around you for years, and just didn’t realize it.

They’re the type of friends who support you in everything you do, and gives you comments/criticisms/suggestions without fear of offending you. You may have totally different interests, work in different fields/industries, come from different walks of life–the fact remains that you simply enjoy talking to each other (about anything and everything under the sun). They would understand and not take it against you if you have to cancel on a meet-up or appointment, whether your excuse is that you’re busy with work, or too lazy to go out. They accept you for who you are; they do not force you to change your behavior/habits (unless it’s a bad vice that would put your health and life at risk, of course).

And then you realize that because these friends have accepted you–faults and all, you begin to love yourself a little bit more. You learn to appreciate yourself–your dreams, ideas, skills (life, academic, professional), values, personality, looks. And after getting to know different kinds of people, you realize that you’re happier being yourself than trying to change who you are.